Giants manager Bruce Bochy embraces the World Series trophy before shipping it back to San Francisco. / H. Darr Beiser, USA TODAY Sports

by Bob Nightengale, USA TODAY Sports

by Bob Nightengale, USA TODAY Sports

DETROIT - The San Francisco Giants front office staff sat quietly in the cramped manager's office at Comerica Park early Monday morning, sipping champagne, drinking beer and trying to make sense of what just transpired.

Three weeks ago they were on the brink of elimination, down 2-0 to the Cincinnati Reds in the best-of-five National League Division Series. A week later they were in a similar spot, trailing 3-1 and one loss from elimination in the NL Championship Series vs. the St. Louis Cardinals.

Now they were making room for a Major League Baseball official to haul a luggage crate into the office, where the World Series trophy was to be packed and shipped back to San Francisco for Wednesday's parade.

Indeed, the Giants' second World Series title in 24 months just as easily could have never been.

Before they were facing elimination in the playoffs, they were facing a pitching crisis. But when October arrived, injuries and slumps were put in the past and the result was the most dominant playoff pitching performance in more than a century.

In sweeping the Detroit Tigers, the Giants threw two shutouts and yielded a 1.46 ERA, giving up 20 hits in 37 innings. The starting rotation allowed one run in the first three games, a World Series feat last accomplished by an NL team in 1905 by the New York Giants, who were led by Christy Mathewson's two shutouts.

The Giants finished winning seven consecutive postseason games and outscoring the opposition of 36-7. The starting rotation yielded five runs in those seven games with a 0.99 ERA. The Giants were the first team since the 1966 Baltimore Orioles to post back-to-back World Series shutouts, and the first National League club to perform the feat since 1919.

"I don't know if you can call it a dynasty," Giants reliever Jeremy Affeldt said, "but I know we were part of something amazing."

Yet, there won't be a Hollywood movie or actors clamoring to play roles. There are no authorized book deals. There may not even be a syllabus left behind to explain how it happened.

"We'll still keep a low profile," says Giants general manager Brian Sabean. "That's who we are as people. That's who we are as an organization.

"We don't promote ourselves. That won't change. That will never change."

A new star is born

This is a team that once relied on the star power of Barry Bonds, but now, five years after he roamed AT&T Park , there's a new star in town.

"Pitching is our celebrity," Sabean says.

And yet, there were significant issues with the pitching throughout the season:

-- Closer Brian Wilson pitched in two games before succumbing in April to season-ending Tommy John elbow surgery. The Giants spent most of the season looking for a replacement, with pitching coach Dave Righetti pleading in August for somebody to step up. Sergio Romo answered the call and morphed into Mariano Rivera down the stretch and allowed one run in 10 2/3 innings in the postseason.

-- Barry Zito, their $126 million flop entering the year, turned out to be the most consistent pitcher throughout the season. He saved the Giants' season with his NLCS Game 5 performance, and out-pitched defending Cy Young Award winner Justin Verlander in Game 1 of the World Series.

-- Ryan Vogelsong was leading the league in ERA in mid-August before blowing up in his last 10 starts with a 6.75 ERA. But he righted himself in the nick of time at season's end and became the ace in October with one of the best postseason performances by a starter in 25 years, going 3-0 with a 1.09 ERA.

-- Affeldt, who kept a thumb injury quiet the last few weeks, put together one of the most dominant left-handed relief performances in postseason history with 101/3 shutout innings.

-- Madison Bumgarner was rocked in his first two playoff starts with an 0-2 record and 11.25 ERA and lost his spot in the postseason rotation. But on the eve of the World Series, Bochy turned to him again, naming him to start Game 2. He responded with seven shutout innings.

-- And speaking of moving to the bullpen, that's where two-time Cy Young Award winner Tim Lincecum ended up in the World Series. The right-hander had already suffered through the worst season of his career. Then, in the middle of the playoffs, pitching coach Dave Righetti had a private heart-to-heart talk in the back of a weight room about converting to middle reliever. It paid off big, with Lincecum pitching 42/3 scoreless innings.

"The only thing that bothered me through all this was that I kept hearing people say we were lucky. We were getting the breaks, the bounces," manager Bruce Bochy says. "You don't luck into 94 wins.

"You don't luck into the postseason.

"You don't luck into the World Series.

"You don't sweep a great team like the Detroit Tigers by being lucky."

Bochy looked around his office and across the hallway. There was Righetti, who Bochy calls the best pitching coach in baseball. Sitting quietly by himself was Dick Tidrow, Sabean's right-hand man, who finds the pitching talent with scouting director John Barr.

Steve Balboni, Pat Burrell, Keith Champion, Lee Elder Paul Turko and Brian Johnson were the scouts who dissected the Tigers' weaknesses, turning a powerful offense into a .159 hitting lineup in the World Series. Danny Martin, the pitchers say, was invaluable as their video coordinator.

"Those are the unsung heroes," Sabean says. "People don't know their names, but we're sure not here without them."

Who knew Zito?

The Giants' wild celebration was just starting to die down , and Zito was still shooting video and conducting interviews.

Two years ago he was left off the postseason roster. He wasn't good enough to be one of their four starters, and there was no need for him in the bullpen. Yet, he never complained.

He struggled in spring training, and Righetti was worried that this year might be more of the same for a guy who won just three games in 2011. Righetti told him to stand tall on the mound, allowing him to utilize his curveball again, and to pitch to contact, .

"He realized he needed to do something," Righetti said. "He straightened up more, and didn't worry about the velocity."

Zito opened the season with his first shutout in nine years, won 15 games, his highest total since 2006, and finished with the Giants winning his last 15 starts.

"When he threw that first shutout," Righetti said. "We were all going nuts. We thought, 'OK, maybe he'll have a hell of a year.'"

Who knew?

The Giants bullpen became a mess when Wilson was lost. The team used six closers in his absence.

Romo, who had saved only three games in his four-year career, took over in August and never let go, though. He struck out the side in the 10th ending of Game 4 Sunday to clinch the title, his third save of the World Series.

"We were in St. Louis," Righetti says, "and we called them into the office and basically said, 'This is the way it's going to be. You guys are going to have to be the guys who decide how it's going to settle out. We want one guy to be able to take the ball at the end of the game, too.

"Romo picked it up, and that was the moment that the 'pen came together, and when they did, the starters got pumped, knowing their games would be protected."

There were adjustments everywhere.

Vogelsong, who struggled down the stretch, was told to move back on the pitcher's rubber. He followed Righetti's advice, and pitched 52/3 shutout innings in Game 3 of the World Series to finish with the lowest postseason ERA by a starter since Orel Hershiser's 1.05 ERA for the Los Angeles Dodgers in 1988.

"That's all he did," Righetti says, "and sometimes that gives a guy a feeling that things will be all right."

Bumgarner's problem, Righetti says, was to stop looking at the radar gun and just pitch. Bumgarner tooks his eyes off the reading and voila! Seven shutout innings in Game 2.

"I told him, 'You're a lefty. You can pitch for 20 years. Quit looking for 93 (mph). You've got to do this or we'll look for somebody else," Righetti says. "That's all you needed to tell him.''

And then there was Lincecum.

He went 10-15 with a 5.18 ERA during the season and in his only start in the postseason gave up four runs in 42/3 innings to the Cardinals. Lincecum's struggles with his control were so acute that he ditched pitching from the windup and went exclusively from the stretch.

Bochy, Righetti and Sabean huddled and talked about what to do. They decided to use him in the bullpen, and that Righetti would broke the news.

"Me and Timmy sat in weight room by ourselves," Righetti says, "and we had a quiet talk about some things. I'll leave it that. That's as far as I'll go with that. He accepted that.

"It wasn't the easiest thing to deal with, and not many guys have had to."

The move paid as Bochy had an additional weapon to use against the Tigers . Lincecum will return to the rotation next year, Bochy says, but he'll now have a matching World Series ring for each hand to go along with those Cy Young awards.

"It's amazing what a team can do when they set aside their own agenda,'' Bochy says, "and that's what they've done all year.